


Cover of Night

by wintersjackson



Series: Urban Magic RWBY [9]
Category: RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, F/F, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-03
Updated: 2015-01-03
Packaged: 2018-03-05 04:17:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3105353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wintersjackson/pseuds/wintersjackson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>[Blake would be fine with Weiss staying up all night if she didn’t have to do it in the darkest, most dangerous allies of the city. Meanwhile, some less than harmless figures meet over something which should have died a long time ago.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cover of Night

“You really shouldn’t be out of bed, yet alone in the middle of the Fae slums,” the silky voice scolded gently from the pitch-darkness of the alley. A moment later the blackness parted and a white figure strode out, pushing against a limp as if on the warpath. A black cat the size of a german shepherd strode out a moment’s later behind her, but any night presences that might have been turned back by the feline had already fled the furious shaman leading the charge.

“Are you going to keep complaining about things that aren’t going to change or are you going to tell me where in hell we even are at the moment?” Weiss retorted. Her foot suddenly slipped as she braced her stronger leg for the next step and she stumbled heavily against a wall. There was the sound of a heavy sigh from behind her, and then a much taller woman was holding her arm loosely around their shoulder and guiding her to a bench illuminated by a solitary streetlight. She spluttered a little at the indignity, but almost as soon as she was summarily dropped onto the wooden seat the black shape was winding around her legs again.

Now that her weight was off her feet again it was distinctly hard for Weiss to keep her breathing steady, her forehead and sides painful and hot but her leg one great mass of agony on the edges of her awareness. She sucked in a shaky breath, determined to get back up, but her leg was trembling at the very idea of it, and she sank back into an exhausted heap with a grimace.

She’d told herself, returning to the mansion after her recovery with the Witches, that the recovery would be the easy part. She’d be heading back to comfort and wealth and relaxation. The magical healthcare would be absent, certainly, but what still pained her were mostly things science had at least a handle on suppressing. She would be idle around the house for a week or two while she got back to 100%, then on as normal.

This was the fifth night since returning to the mansion and she’d sworn if she didn’t get out on a walk by sunrise she was leaving through a window.

“What exactly are you trying to prove with this?” Blake asked, head poking up to rest gently in Weiss’s lap. “And don’t try and fool me with that ‘bored’ nonsense because bored means a few walks around the block, not cutting a straight line across the city to where you almost died. At least, I assume that was the intention, your sense of direction still needs some work.”

Weiss bit down a harsh remark and leant down to scratch her companion’s ears, trying to think of a response that didn’t sound guilty or indignant. It would be pretty weak to keep lying to herself about why she was here if even Blake could see through it, after all. Sometimes she wished the cat would at least pretend to humour her moods.

“No-one gets to rule me,” she muttered defiantly after a long pause, cringing as she unconsciously tensed and her leg signed its disapproval again. “Ever since I was young. I couldn’t exactly be blasé about it, or I’d lose what little freedom I had.”  
She cautiously glanced down again, and Blake was watching silently. With a small sigh she brushed her hand over her off-centre ponytail, reminding herself it was still there, still intact.  
“My hair was the first step. Symmetry is consistency, and consistency is everything within the company. Everything from our fashions to our product lines are usually recycled from just far enough back not to be immediately recognisable. I turned my back on the trend as soon as I was old enough to understand how. In fact, after my birthday when the spirits ambushed me, I might have ignored what they told me just to spite them if not for you, the fact I knew it would give my father a heart attack had he known, and...”

She trailed off, and she felt her familiar’s black-on-black eyes fixed on her, but Blake stayed silent and patient. Weiss gave a slight appreciative nod as she gathered her breath, continuing on slightly more quietly. Her hand tightened carefully in her familiar’s ruff as she reminded herself of their mutual presence.

“And the fact I finally felt like I might be able to make a difference. No more repeating tradition and aiding suppression. I might finally have a chance to help people, really and inarguably.”

Blake pointedly looked around the deserted, freezing-cold street, then back at Weiss.  
“You’re going to have to fill in the gap for me here, because I fail to see how this helps people, or gets back at anyone but the doctor responsible for checking your condition in the morning.”

Weiss would have cringed if a flash of memory didn’t make her hand suddenly freeze up, pulling harshly on the cat’s neck. Blake let out a surprised choke but glanced up with more worry than indignation. After a moment the expression softened and she looked away.

“The spirit that attacked you. This is your attempt at showing that what she did didn’t affect you.”

Weiss sniffed, clenched her jaw and tried to hold onto Blake tight enough it wouldn’t be clear that just that moment’s lapse in her mental block had her shaking with fear. Now that the angry energy had drained away, this dark street just seemed cold and constricting and threatening.

Except for Blake. Blake had saved her. Blake was a bastion of security in this place.

“I went to the kitchen this morning when I woke up,” she croaked. Blake just watched as she tried to get the words out. “It-it had been raining, and w-when I got there one of the maids was...shaking off an umbrella.” She pressed the heel of her spare hand against each of her eyes in turn, knowing it wouldn’t help but needing to do something. “It didn’t even look like the parasol the spirit had, just an ordinary umbrella...but I was terrified. I collapsed, I could f-feel all the cuts again...the maid thought I slipped. Winter is still at the other house, so I hid in her room until I could clean up and... change.”  
She looked up at the cat with trepidation, expecting either a cold stare or nothing at all, and Blake did not disappoint. 

This had never been part of the plan, Blake admitted grudgingly to herself. No matter how angry she’d been at Weiss, her concerns had been valid, hadn’t they? Blake had used one rule for herself and one for everyone else. And it had backfired, horribly, and she hadn’t even been the one to pay the price. She’d kept an eye on Weiss even after she’d ‘disappeared’:a network the city wide of cats-eyes in the shadows, ever loyal. She’d told herself it was a reasonable reaction.

But once night had fallen her spies had done what cats did, and she’d lost track. If it hadn’t been for one stray tomkitten-  
Blake refused to think anymore on that. But now, Weiss was hurt. Not just physically, not even just that and mentally, but spiritually. The spirit had left claw marks in the shaman’s very soul, and Weiss didn’t even know.

So she turned and stalked away from the bench, tail twitching gently as Weiss exclaimed in fear as she faded into the darkness.

“Stay there,” Blake called back as she heard Weiss struggle to rise. “This is important.”  
It took a little longer than she would have liked, but soon she stalked back into the lamplight, a long straight branch clasped between her jaws.

Weiss felt like a child, being so reassured by Blake coming back into sight even when she could sense her familiar just a minute’s walk away. Still, she sagged in relief when she returned, before frowning in confusion at the gift gently laid in her lap.

“This is a stick?” Weiss confirmed with confusion. Blake gave her that little disapproving look she spared for whenever Weiss got her terminology confused.  
“This is a staff,” the feline corrected, but paused when she looked up at Weiss’s expression. “And for now a stick, yes,” she admitted as the gift was turned over and inspected. “And you’re getting it because its the next step in your training. This is greenwood, and oakwood, and deadfall, and one or two other things that mean it would usually only be good for the fire. But it will be a fine teaching tool, until you can choose and carve one of your own.” Weiss was giving her a look toeing the line between suspicious and hopeful. Perfect.

“You’ve noticed how long it takes to pull off most of a shaman’s rituals, right?” A small nod. “And I bet one or two of them would have been a great reassurance if anything tried to hurt you again and I wasn’t there.” A firmer nod. “Well, that’s what the st...ick is for. With the right training and time spent, we can bind spells into its core. It won’t last forever, and it will take more lessons on top of what you have already just to begin the technique this early in your training, but if we start with the basics, and you turn that fear into bravery, by the time you’re seventeen... if that spirit tries again, she won’t know what hit her.”  
She felt as much as saw the smile spread across her friend’s face, and when Weiss rose to her feet her hand only rested on Blake’s back as the staff bore her weight.  
“Think it’s time to head home, Blake?” Weiss asked, and Blake could hear the optimism seeping into her every word. “I can get a little rest and then we figure out where to start after the doctor grounds me for another month.”  
Blake rumbled her agreement, butting happily against Weiss’s leg as the two slowly staggered home.

~

“You shouldn’t have come,” The towering figure said bluntly as soon as Ren cleared the fire escape. No-one among the few souls still up was looking skywards on a stormy night like this, even if the clouds seemed to be waiting their moment to let the downpour begin, and the two had used the meeting spot before. It had still been a while, to the point Ren could have sworn the building used to be shorter.

“Then why wait for me?” Ren shot back, bending over for a moment as he focused on getting his breath back in him. When the figure came over and loomed impatiently he dug a folder out of his pocket, holding it as high as he could comfortably reach and just clearing the figure’s chest. It took it and leafed through it quickly, and it crumbled into ash before Ren could ask for it back.  
He frowned slightly. “Those aren’t cheap.” It tossed the ashes to the floor with a note of disgust.  
“Hearsay. All I’m seeing is circumstantial interaction between an old legend and the rumours of the weak and petty. If you called me back from Svartalfheim to hunt geese...”  
“The phrase is ‘a wild goose chase,’” Ren tsked, “and I’ve seen her myself. You weren’t exactly fast getting here.”  
That got their attention. Ren allowed himself the satisfaction of a crooked smile.  
“And you’re absolutely sure its not just a Redcap out of cover? The ‘Metal-Handed Fox’ is better known than our ‘Cruel Mistress’ after all.”  
Ren didn’t immediately answer, which was of course all the answer they needed. They strode to the edge of the roof as the clouds slowly began to release their contents over the city below.  
“And Dragonflower?” The figure suddenly asked, and behind the bone mask and exotic battle armour Ren could see them tense in sudden insecurity. “The...’Precious Cargo’?”  
Ren smiled, pausing on his way back to the stairs.  
“They’re both doing well. ‘Beloved’ had their birthday last month. I’ll put some pictures in the dropbox.”  
They gave a small nod of gratitude, and when the first peal of thunder split the sky and Ren had blinked the lightning out of his eyes, the figure was gone.


End file.
